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THE CHICAGO ADDRESS. 

Signs of the Times: 

From the Standpoint of a Scientist. 



AN ADDRESS DELIVFRED AT THE FIRST METHODIST CHURCH, APRIL 26, l8$X 
UNDER THE AUSPICES OV THE 



WESTERN SOCIETY FOR PSYCHICAL RESEARCH. 






Prof. ELLIOTT COTES, M. D., 



MEMBER OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES; OF THE LONDOK 

SOCIETY FOR PSYCHICAL RESEARCH*, OF THE THEOSOPH- 

ICAL SOCIETY OF INDIA, ETC., FTC. 



"Per aspera ai/ astral 



CHICAGO: 

RELIGIO-PHILOSOPKICAL PUBLISHING HOUSE, 

1S89. 



L 



LjL 



'^<r:^A 



i 



(^r^^U^l***-^ f~ 




THE CHICAGO ADDRESS. 

Signs of the Times: 

From the Standpoint of a Scientist. 



AN ADDRESS DELIVERED AT THE FIRST METHODIST CHURCH, APRIL 26, l8SS, 
UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE 



ff 



— BV 7 ■ 

Prof. ELLIOTT COCJES, M. D., 



MEMBER OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES; OF THE LONDON 

SOCIETY FOR PSYCHICAL RESEARCH; OF THE THEOSOPH- 

ICAL SOCIETY OF INDIA, ETC., ETC. 



"Per aspera ad astra" 



CHICAGO: 

RELIGIO-PHILOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING HOUSE. 

1SS9. 






Copyright, 1888. 
By Keligio-Philosophical Publishing House. 



Gift 

Carnegie Muse-Li a Pittsfouri 



DEDICATION. 



TO 

COL. JOHN C. BUNDY, 

Editor of the Religio-Philosophical Journal, 

a fearless defender of the faith and leading 

Exponent of True Spiritualism, these 

Pages are Inscribed with 

high Regard 

b Y 

THE AUTHOR. 



PUBLISHER'S NOTE. 



Professor Coues' Address originally appeared in the Reli- 
gio-Philosophical Journal of May 12, 1888, from the Author's 
notes. It was immediately issued from the Journal's print in 
Light, the leading English Spiritualistic periodical. Both 
these editions being practically exhausted, and the demand for 
the Address continuing, it is now republished in book form, 
from revised manuscript furnished by the Author. In its pre- 
sent form it is the only edition authorized by Professor Coues. 



THE 

Signs of The Times 



From the Standpoint of a Scientist, 



Ladies and Gentlemen: 

Responding to the flattering invitation of the Western So- 
ciety for Psychical Research, I have come from afar to address 
you to-night on a subject that has the most vivid interest. I 
congratulate myself on the privilege of speaking to this cultur- 
ed and thoughtful audience, assembled in earnest to hear what 
poor words may do even scanty justice to the Signs of the 
Times in which you and I take living part. I wish to speak 
— not as the special advocate of this or that school of thought ; 
not as an iconoclast of any established belief; neither as a Spir- 
itualist, nor as a TheosojDhist, nor as one wedded to any doc- 
trine — but simply as one thinking human being may address 
another when confident that his theme concerns them both alike. 
I should be guilty of intellectual recreancy did I fail to speak 
as I truly think; and I beg for my thoughts the same kindly 



2 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

and sympathetic hearing that I would give to yours were our 
places reversed. I would not that this church should resound 
with words alone. There is another atmosphere about us than 
the air we breathe, a subtle element to stir, that an inner sense 
may catch its rhythmical pulsation and be moved in close ac- 
cord. 

THE WOMAN QUESTION. 

And the first among the Signs of the Times is the "Woman 
Question." That is, indeed, not only first, but also last, and al- 
ways. This is a sign whose full significance we shall see before 
I have done. And second, Spiritualism, well-named the "Main- 
stay of Religion and the Despair of Science." And third, Psy- 
chical Research, to which we turn wistfully for light upon the 
deeper problems of life. There is needed no Theosophy to 
discern in these three things a trinity of force that needs but 
some fulcrum on which to turn the world. These are the Signs 
. of the Times we shall question to-night, whether they be only 
surface ripples to pass with the idle winds, or whether, indeed, 
such tremors portend a violent upheaval of ground considered 
secure. Never yet has a throe of nature come without fair war- 
ning. Nothing is born to live without premonitory pains. No 
alarmist I, who have faced the facts too many years for that I 
But history will fail to repeat itself, and such failure would 
mean that eternal cycles of time should swerve from an appoint- 
ed course ; that human progress should not be an orderly unfold- 
ing of man's destiny, but a spasmodic struggle against fate 
— history fails us, I repeat, if men now living do not witness, 
on the turn of this century, greater changes than any of us know 
as yet; do not experience in their own lives the full cumulative 
effect of spiritual and material forces which have been in silent 
operation for the past six hundred years. That is the law. 
That is the Law of Karma, escape from which the world has 
never known. 

The progress of evolution, of development, is never in one 
straight line. It is revolutionary; it is cyclical; it returns upon 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 3 

itself. Yet never back to its starting point, but always like a 
spiral coiling higher and higher ; and every completed turn of 
the coils is marked by changes that seem to be catastrophes if 
viewed alone, but appear harmonious and necessary when seen in 
the light of all that has gone before. Nay, more ; the greater 
revolutions of the wheels of Fate are ablaze with prophetic fire 
for those whose eyes can bear the light of an EzekieFs vision. 
For the causes of yesterday become the effects of to-day, and 
these the causes of to-morrow in turn. This law remains^ 
whether days, or years, or centuries are taken into account. It 
is the cycle of 600 years that I first call to your attention to ac- 
count for what goes on to-day. This is not merely a political 
cycle of such length ; not a round-up of human history only; but 
a far deeper and more necessary turning-point, a very astronom- 
ical period in the life of our planet. It is hard to realize this; 
hard to bring it home to our thoughts and feelings, that now is 
one of these turning points. Yet this is historically true; for 
revolutions — by some called revelations — have not failed to re- 
cur for twenty-four hundred years at least, at intervals of six 
hundred years. At each one of these periods the figure of a 
man has stood as the visible embodiment and very incarnation 
of the spirit of his time, the index of mighty issues of the ful- 
ness of time. 

THE NAROS OR CYCLE OP 600 YEARS. 

There are students of mystical lore, especially among the 
strange beings who call themselves Rosicrucians, who trace the 
naroses or cycles of 600 years much further back. I will be con- 
tent to mention but four, each in the briefest word : In the year 
1222 one of the greatest conquerors the world has ever seen was 
at the hight of his glory ; the great Mongolian chieftain, styled the 
u perfect warrior, 1 ' had overrun the Eastern Continent and es- 
tablished his rule from what is now Turkey to far Cathay- 
sole monarch by right of might over millions of men left living 
witnesses of a million slain. The night of the dark ages brood- 
ed over Europe, while the heel of the conqueror stamped on the 



4 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

neck of Asia. Five years later Genghis Khan, personification 
of brute force, was mouldering dust ; and conjunctions of plan- 
ets in the skies, those strange portents from heaven to earth, at- 
tested the turn of the cycle from whose initial point the spirit 
of light was to struggle with Europe for such ascendancy as we 
behold to-day, and take 600 years to reach her zenith. 

Who or what before Genghis Khan? In the year 622 — ex- 
actly 600 years before — the founder of Moslem was 40 years old. 
Then occurred the Hegira, and the v initial impulse was given 
to one of the ten great religions of the world. Millions of men 
have gone to the Mountain, or the Mountain has come to them, 
under the banner of Mahomet, whose coffin has hung in the air 
ever since for millions of believers, the while that like countless 
throngs have crossed the thread of Alsirat to the Paradise of the 
Blest. 

Unwind now the coil yet another 600 years. Need my Chris- 
tian friends be told that the Star of Bethlehem had risen? The 
wise men had worshiped ; the shadow of the cross was immi- 
nent on Calvary. The God -made man returned to his Maker; 
and by his life was kindled in the hearts of men a light never to 
be quenched, ever to flash athwart a world with growing 
splendor. 

Uncoil the thread once more — yet another turn of the v 
Wheel of Life that spins the web for 600 years. If there be a 
Buddhist here to-night, let him think of the time when his Lord 
Buddha brought from heaven the Light of Asia, that should 
burn through the ages till one-third of the human race should 
have caught its gentle, patient ray. 

Verily hath the spirit been left without a witness never ! 
That spirit, omnipotent, for weal or woe, is not for a day, but 
forever. Great incarnate Avatars or messengers speak to races 
and nations and epochs. Lesser angels or demons, as the case 
may be, speak to us every one, every day and hour, if so be it 
we can hear the voice of the silence within the heart. 

And this is 1888. No further oif than a life time of one man 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 5 

is the finishing of the last 600 year cycle from 1222.* My friends, 
do you wonder that the times are critical? Not that we need 
expect the millennium, or prepare our ascension robes to-night ; 
for the mills of the Gods can be trusted to grind on awhile yet. 
But we may recognize in what I have said some reason for the 
strange and otherwise inexplicable crisis which confronts us. I 
discern in it a kind of consummation or fruition of great social, 
intellectual and moral forces, which have long been stealthily 
at work. A glance at some recent steps we have taken will 
show where we stand. 

THE INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF WOMEN. 

For example, the woman question. I have just come from 
Washington and from the most deeply significant spectacle it 
has ever been my lot to witness. I mean, of course, the Inter- 
national Congress of Women. It was magnificent ! With scarce- 
ly a metaphor, I may say this Mary is big with fate ; this is a 
very pregnancy of the times overshadowed by a mighty spir- 
it ! My heart was sad as I sat in that vast throng and heard 
th.3 burning words of appeal for rights- --for rights only, not 
privileges or favors; for the right to be heard; for the equal 
rights of both sexes ; for the right to abolish odious discrimina- 
tions against the weaker by the stronger; for the right of equal 
education : for the right to take part in social reforms ; for the 
right to promote social purity and temperance and every vir- 
tue; for the right to earn a living; for the right of j^olitical 
franchise; for the right to the pursuit of happiness in her own 
way. The thought came over me: What injury and insult the 
brave leaders of the movement, and through them every woman 
in the land, have suffered during the forty years of their wan- 
derings in the wilderness of the arrogance and the ignorance of 



*From the year 1222 to 188S is exactly 663 year>. The coinci- 
dence, — if it be nothing else, is more striking than had occurred to 
me in penning these lines. The Qabbalist may perceive the full 
significance of the numbers. "Here is wisdom. He that hath un- 
derstanding, let him count the number of the beast; for it is the 
number of a man; and his number is six hundred and sixty and 
six."— [John, Revel , Ch. 13, v. 18. 



6 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

my own sex, before so much as a sight of the promised land was 
theirs, or even a respectful hearing. But then came the glad re- 
vulsion of feeling. That is done with, and we are all so far 
ahead. As I listened to the addresses, I could not help pon- 
dering that strange thing which some of us know as psychic 
force or spiritual power ; it seemed to me then, if never be- 
fore, a reality. 

Think for a moment of these things : Concentration of 
will-power; the fixed, firm, — if you will, grim determination of 
the great women who have led their cause for a life-time. 
Think of the fixity of purpose ; of singleness of aim ; of disinter- 
ested benevolence; of unselfish endeavor; of ardent aspiration; 
of fervid appeal; of personal example: of unflagging courage; 
of the contagion of enthusiasm, — can such forces be set in ope- 
ration and be futile? No! a thousand times No! These are real 
forces, powers, principles, living and operative. The law of 
gravitation is not a fixeder fact in nature, than that such forces 
are the effectual and necessary causes of concrete results — hard, 
solid facts in human progress, not less substantial and endur- 
ing than the granite of which we rear material edifices. Such 
forces never ferment without leavening the lump ; and the abun- 
dant leaven of the last Convention can be no more disputed 
than explained away. It is a grand result that we see to-day. 
It is all abroad; it is in the air; the birds are carrying the news; 
the flowers are nodding the tidings to one another, thatwoman^ 
rights are secure in America. 

Only ten years ago, such a convention would have been 
greeted with jeers and sneers from the lords of creation. A lit- 
tle further back, had it been attempted, the women might have 
been mobbed, as the anti- slavery heroes were before the cursed 
blot of human bondage and traffic was wiped from the shield of 
the nation with the blood of martyrs to the cause of liberty. A 
little further back, it would simply have been impossible ; for 
women were still sleeping in unseen chains like those the Afri- 
can visiblv wore amongst us. What does this movement mean 



I 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 7 

to us all, — not only to the women most concerned, but to their 
other halves? I will tell you: It is another Declaration of Inde- 
pendence. It means freedom, the watch-word of every true 
American; liberty, dear to every man's heart — to woman's not 
less dear ; independance of thought to the uttermost ; freedom 
of speech to the bounds of propriety; liberty of action to the 
verge of infringing another's equal rights — and these are price- 
less boons, without which man has not humanity's heritage. 

The woman question, as it is called, has a deeper significance 
than appears upon the surface. The "surface indications," as 
they savin the mining regions where we dig in the bowels of 
the earth for hidden treasures, are good. They are witnessed in 
the substantial benefits to accrue to women and hence to society 
from the triumph of their cause. But, viewed from my stand- 
point, which you know is that of a psychic researcher, this is a 
problem in psychic science which has worked out its own solu- 
tion. And that this problem is involved in a still broader one 
I can easily show. That broader problem is not merely politi- 
cal, or social, or even worldly; for it is also spiritual. It is no 
other than Spiritualism. 

Was it not the 40th Anniversary of the Woman's Rights 
Movement that was lately celebrated in Washington? What 
now was the year when the first faint raps at Rochester ticked 
off their message from the passing to a coming generation? 
That was in 1848, just forty years ago. They are twins, I may 
say, — these two great pulsations of the soul-life of the nation. 
Strangely unlike have they seemed to be — this orthodox sister 
and her unorthodox brother ! But they were born of one blood, 
and that the same divine ichor which has sown the seeds of pro- 
gress and reform wherever in the world mankind has passed to a 
higher estate. They grew up together, along parallel lines of 
evolution, though seldom did their faces turn to one another, 
so fixed were the eyes of each upon their respective goals. And 
as they thus grew side by side, the one never knocked louder at 
the gates of Congress than the other has knocked at the door of ~ 



8 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

the understanding of millions of Americans, begging to be heard. 
Upon the answer we give to Spiritualism more depends, for bet- 
ter or worse, perhaps, than upon our reply to any other problem 
which we are now called upon to solve. Spiritualism will not 
dowm, — and why should it? It has come to stay — and w<hy 
should it not? It is no new thing; the seeming newness is our 
rawness; that is all. Spiritualism has been in the world since 
when man, being a spirit, became possessed of a body in which 
to inhabit the world. But that phase of it which we commonly 
call "American Spiritualism," and which is now a great social 
and moral — I almost said a national — question, has grown up 
within the memory of some who are here to-night. This ghost 
no longer comes when church-yards yawn and graves give up 
their dead, smelling of mould and pointing a bony finger; it is 
all abroad by daylight, like any living wight ; a truth most pre- 
cious, or an error "most monstrous,— is everywhere we turn. Its 
advocates, real or nominal, tacit or avowed, have passed from 
the thousands into the millions in the United States. If the 
Spiritualists should band together as a political party, they 
might not elect a President, but they could turn either way the 
scale of a closely contested campaign. Their cause would be 
stronger than any one of the collateral issues in the struggle be- 
tween our two leading political parties. 

No doubt the woman question has suffered more from the 
apathy or indifference of women themselves, as a body, than from 
men's antagonism or hostility. If, for example, a majority of the 
women of America really wanted to vote, they would have the 
ballot to-morrow. They do not want it, with its duties and 
responsibilities. I may add without offence that they are not 
fit for it yet, simply because they have not learned to need it. 
So long as any woman is satisfied with social tyranny, and sci- 
entific insolence, and religious intoleration, she is fit for nothing 
better than to slave on under these several lashes. Servitude 
suits the slave. When she ceases to be at heart a bond-wo- 
man, she will cease to be in bonds. Is there one woman be- 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 9 

fore me who does not know exactly what I mean? If such there 
be, she wastes in waiting on my words much valuable time that 
belongs to her owner and proprietor, be that master the church, 
the state, or a mere man. 

So also, no doubt, has the progress of Spiritualism toward 
any practical goal or substantial worldly reward suffered more 
from differences of opinion and ever fluctuating shades of be- 
lief in its own ranks than from the attacks of its enemies, or even 
from those reproaches which it has brought upon itself justly. 
Since every question of Spiritualism cuts literally deep into a 
man's soul — deeper than fame, or wealth, or power, or any tem- 
poral advantage, because it is not only for now but forever to his 
view — so does Spiritualism kindle and foster every passion, ev- 
ery emotion, every perturbation of the soul that is possible. On 
the one hand, a Spiritualist may be uplifted to the loftiest aspira- 
tions, the purest sentiments, the keenest vision of the soul; on 
the other, may he be bent down to the most grovelling aims, the 
coarsest vices, the very obscuration of the soul, to the loss of 
will-power, judgment, and conscience. Both these extremes are 
witnessed daily. Indeed, it is a giant of terrible, over-master- 
ing potency whom he invokes who dares to "try the spirits," 
whether they be true or false. A genius more formidable than 
ever Aladdin rubbed out of his magic vase springs into exis- 
tence whenever man trims the lamp of life to spiritual fire. 

The ordinary oscillation of men, in their every-day business 
or pleasure, is a narrow sweep of the balance of fate, in com- 
parison with the extent and intensity of vibration set up in the 
soul of one who dares stretch forth his hand to stir the Veil of 
Isis. Men who thrill to a thought and seek the skies, have most 
need to take their bearings well when they "hitch their wagon 
to a star," as Emerson advises. No wonder, then, that Spiritual- 
ism may prove a blessing or a curse ; no wonder that its good 
and bad extremes are far from the ordinary experiences of men ; 
no wonder that its phenomena are at once the mainstay of re- 
ligion and the despair of science. Nor is it in any way remark- 



10 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

able, either that Spiritualists should differ so widely regarding 
identical phenomena, or that busy men of every day should ig- 
nore or decry them as foolishness. But the question cannot be 
ruled out of court, nor can the court adjourn. The human 
court of appeal in all such matters is always in session, and the 
case perpetually recurs. How then shall the case be decided? 

EVIDENCE OF THE TRUTH OP SPIRITUALISM. 

Let us hear some evidence. Is it or is it not a fact, that 
the action of gravitation is sometimes overcome by a superior 
opposing force, so that things which ought to stay down go 
up instead? The answer of Spiritualism is : "Yes, that is a fact." 

Is it a fact, that numberless other mechanical effects and 
physical movements result from the manifest operation of a 
force that is neither mechanical, nor physical, nor vital, nor 
mental, in any sense known to, or recognized by, the orthodox 
science of our day — a force whose origin or source, and whose 
means of manifestation, are alike ignored by science? And 
Spiritualism answers : u Yes, that is a fact, as well attested as 
any natural phenomenon to be found described in ordinary text- 
books of the schools." 

Is it a fact, that this mysterious force, of awful significance 
and most potent consequences, exhibits intelligence, volition, 
purpose, and all the other attributes of mind as distinguished 
from matter? Does it act, in short, as if it had a will of its 
own and knew what it was about? Does it show the quality of 
consciousness? And Spiritualism says emphatically: Yes, that 
is a fact: it does just that." 

Up to this point, though we have gone pretty far, we are 
still on tolerably safe and easily conceivable ground. We have 
only established the fact that a certain mysterious force is iden- 
tical with the powers of our own minds. It is the same force 
which I use to stand my body here and hold this paper and 
speak — a conscious exertion of will-power intelligently direct- 
ed to certain actions by means of the control which my mind 
has over my body. But the next two questions we shall put to 



1 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 11 

Spiritualism, if answered in the affirmative, land us upon the 
shore of the Great Unknown :- 

1. Is it a fact that this immaterial force which Spiritualism 
recognizes can and does act without any known means of com- 
munication between mind and matter — that is to say, without 
any physical body? Spiritualism answers : "Yes, it does so 
act, and therefore is not only a mental but a spiritual force." 
It is just as if I, standing here without any visible body, should 
be able to make this table move by a code of signals and answer 
for Spiritualism, "Yes." 

2. Since this force can answer questions, what does this 
force proclaim itself to be when asked, "What are you?" The 
answer is usually to the following effect : "I am a disem- 
bodied spirit who still lives since my body died, and I am able 
to communicate with you who are still embodied." 

Here is the pivotal point of Spiritualism. This is the an- 
swer, claimed to have been reiterated steadily a thousand times, 
in reply to the old, old question, "If a man die, shall he live 
again?" Faith, indeed, has whispered to hope throughout the 
aires that a man shall live again who has died to this world. 
Intuition universally senses the same thing. Every religion 
depends upon that faith. Every creed includes it ; every church 
declares it with authority. But here and now comes Spiritual- 
ism offering to replace that faith with knowledge; to justify 
that hope by its own fruition; to prove that intuition by intel- 
lectual apprehension; to demonstrate the fact of conscious indi- 
vidual existence beyond the grave. No wonder the Church 
hates Spiritualism worse than it does the Devil. The Devil is 
useful to the church. Spiritualism is worse than useless. For, 
to prove a creed to be true is to kill that creed to all creedal 
intents and for all priestly purposes. Belief and dogma both 
rest on the evidence of things unseen; that is, upon ignorance 
of the facts in the case. To do away with ignorance by sub- 
stituting knowledge — in other words, to produce the evidence 
and prove the point — is fatal to every dogma of ecclesiastical au- 



VZ THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

thority, because every thing that is accurately known is Science 
and not Religion. Considering these and other points, I can 
conceive now no more momentous a question than this : Is 
Spiritualism true or is it false ? 

Thus far, I have been representing fairly what Spiritualism 
claims ; but it is not right for me to be only a mouth-piece of 
another's thoughts. My audience has the right to demand of 
me what I, too, think or believe or know, else there would be no 
use of my being here to-night. I will not stand convicted of 
evading that point — not even if everything I say were to be 
proven wrong to-morrow. 

THE OPINIONS OF A SCIENTIST. 

My whole training in life has been that of a scientist, ac- 
customed to cool, critical, skeptical, yet unbiased examination 
of any question that comes up, scrutinizing all things to the best 
of my mental ability, submitting all propositions to the test of 
verification by actual experiment. I hold my mind open on all 
sides ready to receive and entertain any idea that may seek lodg- 
ing there. I have no preconceptions respecting what is naturally 
possible or impossible. I smile at the conceit which pro- 
nounces a thing "impossible," because that decision presumes 
to have discovered everything that is possible. To my mind, 
nothing I can conceive of is theoretically impossible, outside 
of mathematics or beyond some proposition that is logically 
contradictory in itself. To every deep thinker, one thing seems 
a priori about as likely or unlikely as another, because one un- 
fathomable mystery underlies every phenomenon in nature. No 
explanation can satisfy the mind with anything short of the 
absolutely inexplicable. It is to me no more unlikely that a 
man's soul should live after his body, than that it should not. 
It is no more remarkable that he should have a soul, than that 
he should not have one. I only want to know. In the charac- 
ter of a scientist I am bound to be indifferent to the result of 
that knowing. Good and evil — right and wrong — virtue and 
vice — pleasure and pain — life and death — these are the gravest 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 13 

possible questions of ethics and of religion, but they are no con* 
cerns of science. They are the fruits of knowledge or of ignor- 
ance, as the case may be ; they are the applied logic of morals ; 
but they do not subsist in that mere act or state of knowledge 
which is science. The scientist may know both good and 
evil, and choose the latter, and be a very devil of a scientist, 
literally, without derogation of his scientific character. So in 
this sense I can say: if I have a soul, it is well; if I have none, 
it is also well. I was not consulted on coming into existence, 
and rny private tastes or wishes in this contingency are quite 
foreign to the question. Furthermore, I neither believe nor 
disbelieve on the authority of our Bible or any one of tha 
twenty other sacred scriptures which we possess, or on any au- 
thority whatsoever, save the supreme arbitration of such rea- 
son and observation as I can bring to bear on a. question. Sen- 
timent is foreign to all such investigation. Religion is some- 
thing aside from investigation, since it rests on faith in the 
evidence of things unseen, not on knowledge of things seen. 
Once more, I have no regard for consistency as a jewel, if by 
this phrase is meant that we must stick to our opinions wheth- 
er or no. I would reverse every opinion I ever formed or 
could form, on proof of its wrongness, and be consistent with 
nothing but the laws of mind applied to the laws of evidence ; 
for these intellectual laws are immutable in the human consti- 
tution. They are principles of eternal verity, above, below, be- 
hind, beyond which we can only posit the No-Thing called God. 
"substantially true as alleged." 
Will you have the opinion of such a person as I have des- 
cribed, who for about ten years has studied, watched and fol- 
lowed the phenomena of so-called Spiritualism, and who speaks 
from personal experience with almost every one of them? 
Then let me tell you, I know that the alleged phenomena of 
Spiritualism are true, substantially as alleged. " Substantially 
true as alleged" — that is a broad statement to make. But I 
make it fearlessly, of knowledge in the premises. It is a tre- 



14 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

mendous admission to come from one who has any regard for 
his reputation as a scientist. It is almost scientific suicide; 
and when the news reaches the venerable Smithsonian Institu- 
tion where I live, the wits will be asking if the remains of my 
reputation are to follow by express and have a decent funeral. 
But I had rather be right than in a wrong majority. Those 
persons who know the most are always and necessarily in the 
minority. These things must and shall be said — nay, repeated 
and reiterated, till the observed facts from which the truth of 
Spiritualism is inferred are recognized, explained, and accepted. 
Let these things be repeated in the face of every false dogma 
of the churches ; let them be reiterated in the teeth of every 
wrong dictum of the schools. Time enough to hedge, when 
what are now the secrets of psychic science shall have become 
public property, respectable, fashionable, and popular, — per- 
verted by the priest, and prostituted by the publican, as they 
surely will be in due course. But now r that Error masquerades 
in the very garb of Truth is just the time to talk. 

Let me not be misunderstood, however, and hereafter mis- 
quoted as saying that everything in Spiritualism is true, or that 
all the instances of the alleged phenomena are genuine — far 
from that ! When I say that the alleged phenomena of Spirit- 
ualism are substantially true as alleged, I mean that every one 
of the several different kinds or classes of physical manifest- 
ations can and as a fact does occur. Granted, that most public 
exhibitions, particularly of that strangest of phenomena, mate- 
rialization, are fraudulent, — knowingly, wilfully and shame- 
fully intended to deceive. Granted, that most of the rest are 
obscure, perplexing and unsatisfactory, or unsuited to any in- 
vestigation, though not intentionally fictitious. Granted, that 
yet others are illusory or delusive, and wholly misinterpreted. 
Yet, with all these admissions, and all these grave omissions for 
lack of evidence or through erroneous conclusions, the residuum 
not thus set aside is a vast array of natural phenomena which 
cannot be put aside, cannot be accounted for, as yet, and have 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 15 

not yet been explained to the satisfaction of science or of av- 
erage everyday common sense. In a word, we do not know 
what these phenomena mean, unless, indeed — a tremendous ad- 
mission again [—they mean what they say. 

PHENOMENAL SPIRITUALISM. 

It would take me too far over an almost boundless field 
to traverse each one of the phenomena of Spiritualism, and re- 
peat: This is a fact; that is a fact; the other is a fact. I must 
presume upon the acquaintance of my audience with the gener- 
al drift of the Spiritualists' statements of fact, though, were I 
to draw upon the experiences of a Theosophist, I might add to 
the already sufficiently startling array of phenomena which are 
known to be true. But I must pass on to the next and most 
obvious questions. Supposing these things to be true, what are 
we going to do with them? What use shall be made of them? 
How shall they affect our thoughts and lives? How shall they 
be brought into the current of ordinary human affairs, that they 
be invested with a practical, not merely theoretical, — a vital, 
not merely a speculative, — interest, and be made subservient to 
human welfare and progress? There should be a niche in the 
Temple of Science for many a truth that now begs for a place ; 
there should be room in every human breast for truth, even new 
truth. Else there is something wrong with science and with 
sentiment, and the times are out of joint indeed. 

To face fearlessly, to answer honestly, to settle if possible, 
these questions, would seem to be the peculiar province of psy- 
chic research ; and if such a thing as psychic science be possi- 
ble, I have no fear for the result of the investigations now con- 
ducted in many cities besides Chicago, by men who are hon- 
est, who are intelligent, and who are not afraid to follow the 
truth as it seems to them, wherever it may lead. I am true to 
my own cloth. I have faith in science if in nothing else, and I 
am just the one to call most loudly for scientific methods to be 
applied to all subjects of human investigation. If Spiritualism 
or Theosophy is leading me a wild-goose chase over a treacher- 



16 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

ous morass i l n the wake of a will o' the wisp, I want' to catch 
that ignis fatuus, and hold it up, and show that it is not the 
soul of my departed friend, but a quantity of carburetted hy- 
drogen which shines in the dark — more likely, a good solid 
fleshy medium in spirit-robes of luminous paint. 

We are all liable to be mistaken. We have all been de- 
ceived more than once. We are all equally interested to be set 
right and not deceived again. Human nature is mightily prone 
to the marvelous, and takes most kindly to the so-called super- 
natural. Miracles are much more interesting than the proposi- 
tions in Euclid. A man is a religious animal. A God he must 
have, if he has to invent one, in case the ready-made article 
does not suit. It is a trite and a true saying, that people like 
to be humbugged. They want to believe so much, that they 
are willing to believe almost any thing that saves them the 
trouble of thinking for themselves. Else, what would become 
of this church, for example? Give us a respectable authority, 
to season with sanctity an incomprehensible unreality, and we 
are content. If there be a good Jesuit present, who understands 
his business, he knows that I know he is a very useful fraud 
who piously preaches a serviceable fable for the benefit of souls. 
So with every other pretender to knowledge not possessed and 
probably not attainable. Then is no creed true? No, — not one 
is the whole truth, because men have made them all, and man 
is not omniscient. Is a creed useless? No, — it is worse; it is 
pernicious, — so long as you fully believe it. Is any creed use- 
ful? Yes, — if it helps you to get rid of itself — not otherwise. 
When you have done with the farce of formulating your ignor- 
ance and mistaking it for a divine revelation of the wisdom of 
God, then you have been born again. Your creed is as valua- 
ble as an egg-shell to a chick — indispensable in embryonic sta- 
ges of spiritual evolution, later only useful to settle coffee- 
grounds. 

What wonder, then, human nature being what it is, that 
nothing is too palpably absurd to find believers ! What won- 



I 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 17 

der, that persons be found to minister to that want for greedy- 
gain, and prey upon the weak, the ignorant, the credulous ! 
What wonder, that Spiritualism, like any orthodox superstition, 
continues to be shrouded in its own mystery, and encrusted 
with every folly and every frailty to which human nature can 
stoop. We are tempted to turn aside with a sigh, or a shrug, 
perhaps, and say : "Well, it may be true, but I will have noth- 
ing to do with it" I cannot tell you how often that thought 
has come to me, during my long haunting of spiritual circles. 
I used to feel as if I were a ghost myself, instead of one trying 
the spirits; my mind failed to explain what I saw, and often my 
heart sickened at the shams I witnessed, at the shameful impo- 
sitions practiced upon the most sacred and holy emotions of the 
human breast. I was tempted to exclaim : "Is this the pursuit 
of truth? Then it is like fishing for the 'pearl of great price' in 
the gutter. 1 ' But, as I said in the beginning, if Spiritualism 
stirs the lowest and worst part of a man's make-up, so does it 
also reach and move his very highest and best. It plays upon 
the whole gamut of his feelings and is equally potent to evoke 
harmony or discord, as the strings of the mind are swept by 
the unseen hand. That is a thrilling touch, indeed, which at- 
tunes the faith of the learned divine to diviner music still ; 
which pitches the erudition of the scientist to a still higher key ; 
which awakens the man of business to other thoughts than 
those of the store or office; which kindles the enthusiasm of the 
fanatic to heroism or martyrdom. That is a fateful thing, 
which fans the flame of every evil passion to a glare of self-des- 
truction; which unsettles the weak mind and may provoke in- 
sanity. Yet the brooding of the Spirit on human waters moves 
to all these things and more ; seldom does it fail to bring out 
and intensify all that there is of a man, for good or evil. Truly 
it is no light thing. What is to teach us how to handle it with 
safety at least, if not with advantage? What, but knowing more 
about it? To learn and to teach this knowledge is the purpose 
and the object of Psychic Research in whose name we meet. 



18 THE SIGN3 OF THE TIMES 

SAFE GROUND FOR PSYCHICAL RESEARCH. 

Gentlemen of the Western Society for Psychical Kesearch, 
will you think me presumptuous if I try to point out some safe 
ground on which you may stand in this maze of doubt, and 
some lines along which your researches may profitably be push- 
ed? Assuming, as I have said, that the alleged phenomena of 
Spiritualism are substantially true as alleged, how will, you 
proceed to deal with them, and what shall you decide respect- 
ing them? For I need not tell you, it is one thing to establish 
a fact and quite another thing to explain that fact. Granted r 
for example, that a table will rise and hang suspended in the 
air, what holds it up? There is no hope that such an event, any 
more than the converse of it, namely, that the table stays down 
usually, can be fully explained ; for I suppose the action of 
gravitation to be as utterly inexplicable a phenomenon as any 
other in the universe. But it is considered a fair and reasona- 
ble explanation of the table's staying down to say that it does 
so because it is an ascertained natural truth that matter attracts 
matter directly as the mass and inversely as the square of the 
distance. This is according to what is called the "law of grav- 
itation," which is only a statement of an observed relation of 
cause and effect. So it would be a fair and reasonable expla- 
nation of the table's rising, if we had a "law of levitation" back 
of that phenomenon, to which to refer the fact, and thus bring 
it under a known category of cause and effect. But I can hold 
up any weight, not too heavy for me, by means of my muscles ; 
and this muscular force is only the means or medium of the 
exercise of the real power which lifts the weight. The real rea- 
son why the weight is lifted is the will-power which is generat- 
ed or liberated when I make the mental determination to lift 
the weight; and any mechanical device by which that will-pow- 
er can be rendered more effective is, as it were, but an extension 
of the muscular mechanism of my body. In fact, no one can 
stir his little finger without, consciously or automatically, call- 
ing into action an immaterial force which counteracts the opera- 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 19 

tion of gravity ! So, also, any extra mental stimulus which may 
cause the muscles to contract more strongly, and enable one to 
lift more, is but another instance of the general fact of the ac- 
tion of mind upon matter. Such is the ultimate explanation 
possible to the science of our day ; simply the action of mind 
on matter by the means of appropriate vital or mechanical de - 
vices. But you will not have failed to discover in this simple 
and trite illustration, the fact that the ultimate force here acting 
is not physical or mechanical, but mental or spiritual. Thus, 
instantly are we confronted with an actual existing force which 
does oppose, and can counteract, neutralize, and to some ex- 
tent overcome, the force of gravitation. 

If you will agree with me for the moment to regard this 
mental force as the exact opposite of material force ; if you have 
found that material force obeys the law of gravitation ; have you 
not already discovered a principle that may be called a "law of 
levitation?" A weight chooses "to stay down, so to speak. I 
choose that it shall go up. What the weight will do in this case 
is entirely a question of which is the stronger of two opposing 
forces. In the language of the text-books, the weight must 
move in the line of least resistance, whether this be up or down, 
or in any other direction. And let me assure you, gentlemen, 
that if you clearly see and closely grasp this pivotal idea, so 
easy to illustrate when stripped of all details— this idea of the 
oppositeness of mental and material forces — all the rest of your 
inquiries are simply respecting ways and means by which the 
two powers or principles act in opposing each other. It is the 
old question of opposites, — of antagonisms, antitheses, antino- 
mies — in which our individual lives, and apparently the very life 
of the universe, are involved. It is the case of rest and motion, 
of inertia and momentum, of action and reaction, of attraction 
and repulsion, in the physical world. In the psychical world, 
it is the distinction of light and darkness ; of good and evil ; of 
Ormuzd and Ahriman ; of God and the Devil. The very exist- 
ence of all that is, be it spiritual or be it material, depends 



20 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

upon the co-existence of its opposite. This is a necessity of 
Nature. Such is the Law, to which neither Gravitation nor 
Levitation are more than incidental and ancillary. 

EXPERIMENTS WITH A TABLE. 

To continue my simple illustration respecting whether the 
table shall stay down or go up. (1) The materialistic scientist will 
tell you that it must stay down unless some stronger mechanical 
force sends it up. But we have just agreed that when a man lifts 
it, the mechanical muscular force he uses is only the means, 
not the real cause, of its rising ; — that cause being the will-pow- 
er of the man who lifts it. (2) The Theosophist will tell you 
that theoretically it is possible to will the table to rise, so that 
it shall rise without being touched. This would be the result 
of a spiritual power acting without any known mechanical or 
vital means of communicating that power. (3) And, I am sure, 
the Spiritualist will tell you that the table often rises by spirit- 
ual power that is not embodied in any physical organism. 
Which of these three statements of fact shall you find to be 
true? Are the last two statements verifiable? Every one knows 
and admits the first, the mechanical movements of matter, and 
their fair explanation is ordinary text-book science. But is 
there any sense, any truth, any possibility of being true, in 
either of the other two assertions, theosophical and spiritualis- 
tic, which I have quoted? Is it a fact, that matter may be mov- 
ed by will-power without any known means of applying that 
power? Everything else, Gentlemen of the Society, starts from 
and hangs upon some initial point like this. As William 
Crookes used to put it, when he was learning the &, &, c of psy- 
chic research, science does not ask you to move mountains — 
science only asks you to move a thousandth of a grain of mat- 
ter to a distance of a thousandth of an inch by any other than a 
mechanical force. Do this and prove it done ; then you shall 
have crossed your Rubicon between the known and the unknown. 
Then you shall have set psychic research firmly on its legs on 
"the solid ground f nature to which trusts the mind that builds 



I 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 21 

for aye." Then you shall have securely founded the whole edi- 
fice of Psychic Science, against which neither the dictum of 
physical science nor the dogma of ecclesiastical authority shall 
ever prevail. 

Pardon me if I seem to dwell on so very rudimentary a sub- 
ject for psychic research. But if you would not have your body 
of doctrine, like a rope in the air, begin nowhere and end in 
nothing — a rope, too, of sand to fall in your eyes and blind you 
at a touch of orthodox science — you should settle this point of 
the possibility of moving matter without material contact first. 
Do not begin by quoting Scripture or by abusing the Bible ; do 
not lean up against any scientific authority, nor throw any sci- 
entific authority overboard ; do not be religious about it or senti- 
mental, or hopeful, or fearful. Be yourselves unmoved ; simply 
be scientific, rational, skeptical, acutely alive in your physical 
senses and mental processes, to find out whether or not the case 
be as I have said. You may expect the ghost of your dead 
friend to come and move the table for you; you may sit and 
contemplate your navel and say "Aum" to the table in hopes it 
will answer "tatsat"; you may project your astral body into it, 
if you can, — but in any event, by whatever means, first satisfy 
yourself that matter may be moved without material contact. 
Gentlemen, the whole case is yours if you can clearly make out 
this point. There is nothing in "the claims of the most advanc- 
ed Spiritualist or Theosophist that may. not flow logically, sci- 
entifically, necessarily, from this initial movement. 

Any psychic scientist will tell you that such motion has 
been demonstrated and established times without number.* I 
tell you the same thing. I know it to be a fact. But do not 

* The literature of Spiritualism is full of such cases. The levita- 
tion of chairs, tables, pianos, and of human bodies, is a trite subject, 
though I have purposely presented it as if it were novel and still to 
he proven. Some of the most instructive cases for a beginner in 
such investigations are those recorded b} r the eminent physicist 
above mentioned, in which Professor Crookes has measured the ex- 
tent of motion and the amount of force exerted, by means of delicate 
instruments devised and constructed for the purpose. 



22 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

accept it on my assertion or any one's else. Prove it for your- 
selves ; submit it to the test of your own experimentation, and 
subject it to verification by your own observations. Then you 
will know it; otherwise you may only believe it; and this dif- 
ference between knowing and believing is just the difference 
between the science you seek, and the assertions of which we 
have all had an elegant sufficiency. Moreover, in so doing, you 
are cultivating the scientific frame and habit of mind. That 
scientific attitude, poised upon a sincere desire to know, and 
turning upon the love of truth, is one of two indespensable in- 
struments in the laboratory of the Psychic Researcher. 

TEST CONDITIONS. 

I see by the glances among my audience that I am now 
challenged to explain how these assertions can be put to the 
test. Since I have said that matter can be moved without me- 
chanical contact, how can such an experiment be tried? Every 
experiment requires proper instruments, properly working under 
proper conditions. The chemist must have his laboratory; the 
electrician his battery; the photographer his camera, chemicals, 
and dark cabinet; and so it is with the expert in any art, sci- 
ence or industry. What laboratory, and how stocked, does the 
psychist require for his exueriments? Let me tell you a little 
story about this : 

Once at a session of the National Academy of Sciences, I 
listened to a distinguished scientist, Prof. S. Weir Mitchell, of 
Philadelphia, who read a paper on the effect of changes of the 
weather upon pain. We know, of course, how rheumatic per- 
sons suffer in certain weathers ; how persons who carry relics 
of the war in the shape of bullets in their bodies are like barom- 
eters to forecast the weather, so acutely sensitive have they 
become to meteorological influences. I admired the manner in 
which Professor Mitchell introduced his subject, by speaking of 
the difficulty he had found in securing suitable instruments for 
his investigation. It was no ordinary barometer, or thermom- 
eter, or rain-gauge, or weathercock, that he needed — he had alL 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 23 

those. What he required was an instrument that could feel pain 
and have sagacity enough to describe it accurately; a sentient 
and intelligent apparatus, to say just how much it was hurt 
when the wind changed. A man — his patieDt — was his instru- 
ment ; the sick room was his laboratory ; the weather was his 
test condition. The rest was simply a matter of recording care- 
fully what pain was felt or not felt when the weather was so 
and so. Could anything be simpler? 

THE ONE THING INDISPENSABLE. 

And so I can assure you, Gentlemen of the Psychical So- 
ciety, that, given your own fair and able minds, your only other 
indispensable apparatus is a suitable human organism. Your 
only necessary test conditions are patience and careful observa- 
tion. Persons by whose means — that is to say, in whose presence — 
occurs the phenomenon of the movement of matter without phys- 
ical exertion, and its apparent increase or diminution of weight 
without known or assignable cause, are not rare. They are 
in fact so numerous as to form a recognized class in every 
community. I refer, of course, to those who are commonly call- 
ed mediums. Moreover, that strange action of the human or- 
ganism, by means of which one or more of the phenomena 
known as mediumistic or spiritualistic are manifested, may be 
cultivated in almost any person. The rudiments of such facul- 
ties are so common, that I doubt if any dozen persons in my 
audience, taken at random, were to train themselves together 
for a few weeks, one or more of them would not be able to de- 
monstrate the fact upon which I now dwell. The practical 
difficulty is quite another — it takes time, and time they say is 
money, and money is a terrible tyrant in these busy, eager days, 
when few can afford "to loaf and invite their souls" to make a 
table turn. "Loaf and invite their souls, did I say? I wonder 
how many have reflected how literally that agreeable and use- 
ful exercise may be taken ! To the psychic scientist it is exactly 
true and entirely possible. I speak within bounds when I say, 
that if a dozen persons have the patience to form a circle, and 



24 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

keep it unbroken, several nights a week for a month, doing 
nothing whatever but sit still around a table for an hour or two 
a night, the chances are a dozen to one that before the next 
moon they will have unknowingly, unintentionally and unex- 
pectedly demonstrated the fact of material motion by immate- 
rial means. They will have successfully performed that exper- 
iment in psychic science which proves all the rest to be possi- 
ble. They will have rolled away the stone from the tomb in 
which has been buried the hopes of the thousands in this our 
matter- muddled generation. 

THE SPIRITUALISTIC OR THE THEOSOPHIC EXPLANATION? 

To pass on to the next stage of psychic research. I pray 
your patience while I speak very carefully. Suppose it to have 
been proven that matter has moved without material contact ; 
what, or who, has been the mover? "What, the means of the 
motion? Shall we fling up our hands, roll up our eyes, and be- 
lieve that Genghis Khan, or Mahomet, or Washington, or John 
Brown, or any other ghost has been good enough to manifest 
his presence by making the table tip or rap out the letters of 
his name? I do not deny this possibility. I deny no possibility 
outside of mathematics. But I should say that the ghost-the- 
ory is so extremely improbable, involves such violent assump- 
tions, and is so remote from ordinary experiences, that I should 
wish to exhaust the possibility of almost any other theory that 
might be adduced to account for the fact, before being driven 
to such an extraordinary explanation. Nor would I agree with- 
out proof that some Mahatmic adept had shot out from Thibet 
a ray of his majesty to upset the furniture. I should prefer to 
exhaust the capacity of the four walls of the room in which the 
experiment succeeded before seeking further. It is never wise 
to strain a point. It is not sensible to try abstruse and recon- 
dite conclusions, when any simple and obvious explanation will 
answer satisfactorily. As to the case in hand, I do not think 
it illogical to connect the movements of the table in some way 
with the persons who are present. Supposing, of course, all to 



1 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 25 

be acting in good faith, and taking the necessary precautions to 
be sure of that not u just for fun" some one relieves the monoto- 
ny of the occasion with a little muscular exercise; supposing, in 
fine, the conditions to be strictly those called "test," I should 
like to see, first, if the absence of any one of the dozen made any 
difference in the result of the experiment. Suppose it makes 
no difference if A is not there ; if B, C, and so on are absent, till 
at length but one person besides myself is left, and the table 
moves as before. Supposing, further, that the table will not 
budge for me alone. Then the experiment is reduced to its sim- 
plest terms : a piece of inanimate wood ; a medium ; a spectator. 
In other words : a psychic researcher conducting an experiment; 
his instrument of research, a medium ; the result, motion of in- 
animate matter. Here, I think, the researcher should be bound 
to conclude that some influence proceeding from his apparatus 
did effect the observed result. Such an experiment has been 
successfully accomplished thousands of times; and it is neither 
necessary nor legitimate to invoke the spirits of the dead to ac- 
count for the facts, until we have shown it to be impossible that 
the spirit of the living person should have produced the result, 
albeit by some means of which we may remain ignorant. 

Of many such physical manifestations which I might cite, 
a Theosophist who assumes that an embodied spirit may be the 
efficient agent, seems to strike at a simpler possible solution 
than would a Spiritualist who should presume that only disem- 
bodied spirits can act thus. I do not say as yet which of the 
two explanations is the true one, nor deny that either may be 
true according to circumstances, nor affirm that neither can be 
true. I am simply exercising due scientific caution in first 
testing the most probable theory, namely, that the live person 
present is the more likely operator than any dead person absent, 
before trying the least probable hypothesis. You will agree 
with me, that this is only the proper and reasonable prudence 
which psychic research demands, in order that its decisions 
shall either acquire scientific value or gain public acceptance. 



26 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

Thus we are brought to the next stage of our inquiry; for, 
in our hypothetical case we have proved that the movement of 
the table depends upon the presence of our medium. Here we 
are confronted with the very crux of the problem. The whole 
question of Animal Magnetism leaps to the front. Do not be 
afraid, ladies and gentlemen, of the name of the thing — porten- 
tous though that name be, and suggestive of that dreadful 
"dweller on the threshold" of which our Theosophic friends 
speak with bated breath. I am not going to let the animal 
loose; but to describe him. It is not exactly on the threshold 
of your psychic research that you will encounter the creature, 
for you passed that threshold safely when the table first tipped. 
But you have now entered the place where animal magnetism 
must be met, tamed, trained and made your servant, not your 
master. Or else one of two things will happen : You will either 
abandon further research and retire discomfited from your pur- 
suit with little to show for wasted time — or you will perish in 
the attempt to master one of the greatest forces in nature, to 
whose effect you have exposed yourselves. 

ANIMAL MAGNETISM AND ITS DANGERS. 

Most persons live and die in happy ignorance of the power 
of animal magnetism, just as most of us live and die practically 
ignorant of the anatomy and physiology of our own bodies ; of 
the laws of life and death; and especially ignorant of the fact 
that Law, inexorable and inevitable, is as actively operative in 
the mental, moral and spiritual realms, as in the physical con- 
stitution of man. Perhaps they are wise who remain thus ig- 
norant, as willing to forego the secrets of animal magnetism as 
those of the dissecting room, of the shambles, of vivisection. 
Much better back to our office or store or home, and attend to 
our ordinary business and enjoy our usual pleasures, than wan- 
der unguardedly in the laboratory of the magnetizer, at risk of 
an explosion. I am no alarmist, and I detest sensationalism. I 
speak as a sober scientist of some experience in psychic research 
when I say that animal magnetism is a force not to be touched 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 27 

unguardedly — not to be investigated without every precaution. 
It is playing with no ordinary fire ; it is more like arousing the 
lightning's flash, which may strike one dead in unskilful hands, 
and may cook a dinner or tick a message in the hands of one 
who knows how to use the subtile, mysterious force of electrici- 
ty. The most delicate or the most formidable experiments in 
electric science, with powerful batteries and magnets — the most 
ticklish chemical processes whereby the explosives of commerce 
are manufactured — these are not to be attempted without full 
knowledge and every precaution on the part of one who has 
made them a study. Yet we understand these things much bet- 
ter than we do animal magnetism ; by so much the more should 
we approach the latter warily and circumspectly ; if possible, un- 
der the guidance of one who has made the subject a study, 

But I hear you asking yourselves, if this magnetic potency 
is so universal and so dangerous, do we not run greater risk in 
ignorance of it than by making its acquaintance? That is a fair 
question, and one not easy to answer. Though we are all in a 
sense and to a degree at the mercy of currents of animal mag- 
netism, yet ignorance of them does seem, strangely enough, to 
confer some immunity or to act as a barrier of some sort. Is not 
a child exempt from some dangers to which an adult may be ex- 
posed? Is not a prisoner's cell a safe retreat from some perils? Is 
not what is called a good tough hide a shield against some of the 
stings to which a more sensitive person is exposed? To be more 
explicit: A somnambulist may walk the housetops in safety 
during the mesmeric state , but it is dangerous to awaken him 
to a natural sense of the situation. The moment he becomes 
normally and rationally aware of his position, he is liable to 
lose control of his muscles and fall. We are all to some extent 
"sleep-walkers" in the darkness of bodily night, and cannot be 
safely aroused from our dreamy illusions until new faculties, 
suited to new conditions, are developed sufficiently. The som- 
nambulist is actually in no danger, so long as he knows no dan- 
ger. The peril comes with that knowledge. So, again, can we 



2S THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

in our normal state of mind, walk easily enough along the edge 
of a plank laid on the floor, or across a log that spans a rivulet. 
Place now that plank or log across a chasm, and who would 
venture? The imagination would be terrorized, the head would 
swim, and we should fall. Thus to realize a danger may be to 
incur it; thus, knowledge has perils — aye, and sorrows! — from 
which ignorance is its own safeguard. Thus, in the case of 
our hypothetical circle, sitting to develop mediumship, certain 
powers come into action, with certain consequences, which were 
latent before. Every activity, whether of soul, mind, or body, 
entails various consequences which would not have ensued but 
for that activity. Every action is a cause of some result or ef- 
fect; and every such effect becomes in turn the cause of others 
still. And so with the formidable matter of animal magnetism, 
which faces the psychic researcher in the second stage of his 
investigations. For, observe : he will never learn anything by 
reading about it, nor even by witnessing it ! He must study it 
experimentally. He must magnetize or be magnetized ; he must 
practice the art* of magnetizing or suffer it to be practiced upon 
himself. He must demonstrate it in person. He must be the 
magnet himself. All cannot act thus, for various reasons — some 
for one reason, some for another; nor can all men become doc- 
tors or lawyers or merchants or poets or thieves or murderers. 
There is no royal road here ; no study or reflection or theorizing 
or speculating will avail much. This is the reason why much 
so-called psychic research is futile — utterly barren of results, 
unworthy the name of science, unworthy the name of some sci- 
entists, who fancy they can of course investigate it perfectly well 
because they are scientific persons. Never was greater delu- 
sion than this witnessed among people who are left at large ! A 
blind optician — a deaf musician — a dumb rhetorician — a para- 
lytic pugilist — these are the similes that suggest themselves 
when I think of the pretensions of some scientists to expert- 
ship in spiritual affairs. They will fail, and spin theories and 
beat the air. They fight a wind-mill in attacking Spiritualism 



FRO^ THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 29 

and Theosophy, because they themselves are not instruments 
whereby psychic research can be conducted. They will fail, 
where a sick sensitive of Reichenbach or a hypnotic subject of 
Charcot, or a responsive of Carpenter, will demonstrate a great 
fact in psychic science at a touch or a word or a look from one 
who understands the business. Remember, then, the instru- 
ment of research ak ng this line, gentlemen, is always and nec- 
essarily a human being: either the experimenter's own person, 
or the person of ? >me subject over which he has absolute con- 
trol. All experim i* is made on and by and with the bodies of 
men and women — nay, upon and by and with their very souls. 
That is psychic research. Psyche means soul. Think you it is 
to be lightly or ignorantly or blunderingly played upon? A 
thousand times, no ! Here, blunder and crime are one and the 
same thing. 

Recollect, then, that psychic research, if it mean anything, 
means the investigation of the human soul. Not of the body 
alone ; that is physiology or anatomy. Not of the mind alone ; 
that is psychology, of which you may learn from any text-book, 
only a step beyond ordinary physiology, such as every medical 
.man studies. And animal magnetism is the key to the discov- 
ery of the soul that inhabits the body; it is the pass key to every 
mystery of life and death of the body, and to every secret we 
may hope to disclose respecting the conditions of the soul's ex- 
istence after the death of the body. In using that key we open 
the way to all that was barred before. By this means we un- 
lock every secret recess and unveil every mystery of the human 
being that is possible to scrutinize in our present state of exist- 
ence. He must be a pretty brave man, and I think he should 
be a very honest, pure-hearted, truth-loving, kind and gentle 
man, who should undertake psychic research. 

THE GREAT POWER OF THE MAGNETIZER. 

Perhaps I can make it clear now that pursuit of this thing 
exposes one to dangers that otherwise might have slept. A 
person who has magnetized or been magnetized, is never after- 



30 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

ward the same person exactly. The difference is not only men- 
tal. Of course, he has some new experiences and acquires some 
new ideas ; but that is not all. The change is to some extent 
physical. It is like the difference between iron that has be- 
come a magnet, and this same metal before touching the lode- 
stone. In one sense, and to some degree, it is true that we are 
never twice the same from moment to moment of our lives. 
The body is incessantly dying, and the finer principles are cease- 
lessly interacting. But this is true, to a conspicuous extent and 
in a particular sense, of the operation of induced or artificial 
magnetization, as in trance and the like peculiar states. The 
currents of animal magnetism, passing through the particles of 
the body, seem to make some actual bodily change. I would 
almost say some new or different molecular motion is set up. 
Certainly a current of ordinary magnetism passing through iron 
so affects the particles of the metal that they exhibit activi- 
ties and produce visible effects that were before latent if not 
actually non-existent. How prof oundly the whole being, phys- 
ical, mental, moral, spiritual even, can be affected by this ex- 
quisitely subtile, unspeakably powerful force, few are fully 
aware. 

The induction of complete trance by a magnetizer m his 
subject is the most astounding instance of the supreme control 
of one human being over another that the nature of man ad- 
mits. One may kill another's body by any kind of mechanical 
violence, as a blow ; or destroy life by poison, which disarrang- 
es the vital machinery fatally. But in neither case is the mind, 
still less the soul, at the mercy of the murderer. But the mag- 
netizer can deprive a victim of mind without leaving a trace 
upon the body; he may make a lunatic or an idiot of a philoso- 
pher; he may make a criminal of a saint. He can call up at 
will the most fervent religious ecstasy; he can excite with 
equal ease the most malignant and furious passions. He can 
induce artificial lockjaw or complete catalepsy. He can para- 
lyze the will, and blot out the memory. Love and hate— eve- 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 31 

ry instinct, emotion and appetite, attends his sovereign pleas- 
ure. He can suggest crimes which his victim, forgetting the 
source of the suggestion, shall afterward commit at a given mo- 
ment. He can cause various bodily sicknesses at will; he can 
make and unmake the most excruciating pains ; he can render 
the patient insensible to pain and amputate a limb without the 
patient's knowledge. As to hallucinations of the mind he can 
produce at his will and pleasure, they are endless. The subject 
of his art shall see, hear, smell, taste, touch, what the magician 
pleases. He can induce somnambulism, clairvoyance and clair- 
audience, in some cases even to the extent of informing himself 
of what is occurring at a distance. I need not prolong this 
catalogue of his powers, to which it is not using figurative or 
extravagant language to apply the terms superhuman or magi- 
cal, so far above ordinary powers and everyday experiences are 
these actualities of animal magnetism.* 

The moral aspect of this case is a very grave one indeed ; 
but it is obvious. Let me only say, it has come so far to the 
front, in France at least, as to require legislative action ; and 
that upon it hinge some of the gravest medico-legal questions, 
to say nothing of the whole range of professional study of 

* Lest I may seem, however, to have indulged a flight of my own 
imagination, let me cite some authorities which the reader may con- 
sult. I refer to no works on Spiritualism, Theosophy, and the like 
for these are on trial just now, and therefore not competent witness-* 
es. The reader may consult the publications, for example, of the 
London Society for Psychical Research — a body of men never yet 
suspected of leaning towards Occultism, nor indeed of knowing 
much about the objects of their own investigation. The published re^ 
suits of mesmerism or hypnotism, conducted on an enormous scale 
in France, as at Salpetriere, are of great weight, judged from the 
most matter-of-fact professional standpoint. The American Jour- 
nal of Psychology, edited by Professor G. Stanley Hall, of Johns Hop- 
kins University, is mainly devoted to such topics; and the whole of 
the above paragraph might have been taken from its pages, so fully 
do my statements of fact fall within the bounds of orthodox psychol- 
ogy, however widely my own conclusion may be at variance with cur- 
rent opinion. Study of such exoteric publications is advisable, as 
preliminary to the attempt to grapple with the higher aspects of 
the case represented in the literature of esoteric philosophy. 



33 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

alienism or insanity. Let me ask, also, if Theosophists are so 
far wrong, after all, when they say they possess some kinds of 
knowledge and some kinds of power which it is not expedient 
that every one should share? Let me ask the Spiritualists if, 
in this immense range of the possibilities of the spirit while still 
in the body, with that wonderfully organized apparatus at the 
command of trained intelligence and concentrated will-power, 
a good many of the phenomena ascribed to disembodied spir- 
its, and supposed to be feasible to them alone — may not be fair- 
ly and safely referred to embodied intelligences? 

MAGNETISM THE PASS-KEY TO PSYCHIC SCIENCE. 

This brings me back to the position I am trying to hold, 
that of the scientist who looks at these things with an eye only 
to psychic research. This is the field that opens before you, 
Gentlemen of the Society, offering an abundant harvest. It is 
here that you can safely proceed from the well known to the 
less known, and thence to the unknown. Your feet are on solid 
ground. Your instruments are at command, in the persons of 
those whom you can use in your investigations. Have a care 
only, I implore you, that the instruments be neither injured in 
themselves, nor turned against others. Whether you fully be- 
lieve me or not, I know that animal magnetism gives you the 
pass-key to psychic science. It invests you with the Master's 
word* of the greater mysteries in the construction of an edifice 
more splendid than King Solomon's temple, and more enduring. 



*As a matter of Masonic shibboleth, the "Master's word" is Ma- 
habone, or Moabon— variously spelled in different parts of the 
world. It has, or did have, an occult significance in connection 
with the story of Lot in the Bible, known, probably, to few Masons 
who have received or given it 'on the five perfect points of fellow- 
ship" in the third degree of "blue" Masonry. Ihe writer learned it else- 
where than in the Lodge, and consequently violates no obligation 
here. No Theosophist has far to seek for the secrets of any occult 
fraternity in the wor'd. There are two organizations at present from 
which nothing is hidden. One of these is the Theosophical Society of 
India. The other is the College of Cardinals at Rome. It is said that 
the old Roman augurs (whose successors now occupy the Vatican) 
could not look each other in the face without laughing. And be- 
hold how these brothers, F. T. S. and S J., now love one another! 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 33 

But of what avail is this key, if we know not how to use it? 
But for its purpose, it were merely a bauble to hang on the 
breast as a visible sign oi authority. What is the use of the 
Word unless it be spoken to some good end 

What, then, is animal magnetism? Is it a myth, a figment 
of the imagination, an idea only and thus purely immaterial, 
or is it a thing, a concrete objective reality? To define its sub- 
stance or essence were impossible. The most learned electri- 
cian, who uses electricity most skilfully and successfully, is 
silent when asked, "Well, but what is electricity?" To define 
a much more subtile form of force or mode of motion called 
animal magnetism, were still more difficult. But it is a great 
j3oint gained, and a great advance, made, when we clearly re- 
cognize and define its operation and effect. That it is a mode 
of motion, there is no question; for it is a force, aud every force 
ii a mode of motion of something. Heat is a mode of molecu- 
lar motion of ordinary matter. Light is a mode of motion of a 
very delicate, tenuous, ethereal substance known to science as 
luminiferous ether. Electricity is another mode of motion; so 
is ordinary magnetism, as of the loadstone; so is galvanism, re- 
sulting from the chemical decomposition of various substances. 
But animal magnetism differs from all these in at least one res- 
pect, and that is one of supreme consequence. It is partly 
mental, not entirely physical ; and it is capable of acting with- 
out any known medium of communication. This is an energy 
capable of communicating — what? Thought? Yes. Whatev- 
er be the substance that is stirred when this kind of magnetism 
acts and sets it in motion, that is the substance of mind which 
is moved. It is something in which consciousness, thought, 
volition, memory, and all other mental faculties severally take 
form. It is a conveyer of consciousness. It is the medium of 
changes of consciousness, by means of which one's state of mind 
may affect another's state of mind, without any known means 
of transferring the affection or making the cause take effect. 
No one now has the hardihood to deny the manifest and in- 



34 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

cessant action of magnetism, for it goes on constantly under 
our eyes. The effect or result comes into play in the simplest 
acts of mesmerizing. The fact is established, explain it as. 
we may. Mesmer's claims are verified by modern science, 
and recognized alike by those who differ most widely in their 
explanation of the actual phenomena. 

Now since there is no known medium of transfer of the en- 
ergy of animal magnetism ; since there can be no transfer of any 
force without some medium of transference ; and since there ia 
probably no absolute vacuum in any space in nature, it is nec- 
essary to infer that there must be some substance which con- 
veys this energy. What this substance is, in which magnetism 
subsists, in whose motions magnetism is manifested and set to 
work, I do not permit myself to say. Certainly it is no ordina- 
ry matter, as known to the chemist or physicist, for such mat- 
ter can only act mechanically, whereas the substance of magnet- 
ism acts mentally. Yet it is material in one sense, for its mo- 
tions constitute magnetic currents whose visible effect we can 
study. In very truth, there is such a substance, some of whose 
properties I could describe if I would. When I say it is "un- 
known," I only mean unknown to the materialistic science of 
our day, since it is not a kind of matter which can be investi- 
gated by the ordinary methods of the chemist or physicist, 
like any molecular solid, or fluid, or gas. But it has been 
known to some scientists for ages. It has been known longer 
than most of the sixty or more elements which the chemist 
describes ; and it has received more names than any one of the 
chemical elements of the text-books. The oldest name of it 
that I know is "akasa," or "a'kasa." This is the Hindu name, 
given many centuries ago, perhaps by Kapila, the founder of 
one of the four great schools of Hindu philosophy. Theo- 
sophists and other occultists commonly call it the "astral fluid." 
I have often heard Spiritualists speak of it 'as "spirit- light. " 
Some biologists, of the school to which I am supposed to be- 
long, call it "psychoplasm," which literally means "soul-stuff" 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST 36 

or "mind- stuff." It seems to correspond in many respects with 
what Professor Crookes speaks of as "radiant matter," a suppos- 
ed fourth state of matter (the solid, the fluid and the gaseous 
being the other three). Baron von Reichenbach named it 
"od." Such terms as "nervaura," "psychaura," "brain- waves," 
and "zoether," seem to point in the same direction. My friend, 
Professor E. D. Cope, with a bold stroke of genius imagined 
on theoretical grounds the possible existence of some such ethe- 
real substance, which he called an "aesthetophore," or bearer of 
consciousness. I have myself taken the liberty of naming this 
child of my brain, and "biogen," as I call it, is already a word 
well known enough to have found its way into the dictionary. 
I am far from insisting that all these terms mean exactly the 
same thing. For instance, Reichenbach describes and names 
several different kinds of "od." Bat all these names face in 
one and the same direction, and probably indicate one and the 
same thing, under various aspects and from different stand- 
points of observation. The words show a more remarkable co- 
incidence of opinion than might have been expected under the 
circumstances. I shall recur to the subject presently. Mean- 
while, whatever we may call this biogen, it certainly has many 
remarkable properties, different from those of ordinary matter, 
and for the most part quite the reverse. The property which 
chiefly concerns us now, is that of sustaining consciousness and • 
conveying thought. It carries mental images ; and it is capable 
of reproducing in the mind of one person the thoughts that 
have been formed in the mind of another. It is the medium of 
all actual exchange of thought ; for the words we use are mere- 
ly conventional noises which we understand as a code of sym- 
bols agreed upon. It is the means of all genuine mind-read- 
ing. It is the substantial basis of all clairvoyant visions and 
all clairaudient sounds. 

The real existence of this akasic or astral fluid is the secret 
of telepathy, or the affecting of one mind by another at any 
distance without physical means of communication. No fact 



36 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

in nature is better attested than the fact of telepathy, which the 
London Society for Psychical Research has rediscovered and 
carefully demonstrated by thousands of cases, though that So- 
ciety has given no hint that it knows the rationale of telepathy. 
Nay, more: This same biogen, in whose properties telepathy 
has its possibility and its realization, furnishes the material or 
substance which composes the bodies of those strange appari- 
tions or phantoms, with which the public has become familiar, 
and has laughed at and stormed at, known in spiritualistic cir- 
cles as "materializations." These alleged spirits of the dead 
are in most cases (I will not say exactly the percentage of cases, 
but in most cases) deliberate frauds ! Such ghosts are the veri- 
est humbugs in the world, gotten up for money to deceive the 
unwary, just as coolly and carefully as actors "make up" 
for their parts on the stage ! These dummies and effigies rep- 
resent the most flourishing department of the business of com- 
mercial Spiritualism. No ghastlier or more unholy imposture 
ever came out of Babylon or Rome than you may witness for a 
dollar to-clay in Boston, New York, Washington or Chicago. 
But in case of the genuine thing, a materialization is for the 
time being a substantial reality, whose substance consists of 
this astral fluid in a temporary state of condensation, which 
renders it palpable and visible to our ordinary senses. I should 
like to say more just here, but must remember that I am ad- 
dressing a public audience, and take to heart certain guarded 
words of St. Paul. 

Let us instead draw a long breath here and see how far we 
have gone in the last few moments, during which I have been 
speaking of the properties of the astral fluid — from mesmerism 
through telepathy to materialization! It is a mighty power 
we have invoked; almost like magic rises the ghost we have 
conjured, to confront us and refuse to down. For the linking 
of these phenomena is so close, the chain of reasoning is so un- 
broken, that once the least phenomenon called theosophic or 
spiritualistic be proven, the rest follows as a matter of course. 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 37 

The whole body of psychic science is fairly brought before you, 

needing only patience and care in your research to be clothed 

in proper vestments to stand before the world by the side of the 

orthodox physical science of our day. These two should never 

have been separated. Neither can live without the other. As 

the Latin poet says of the famous sisters : 

Fades nou omnibus una, 

Nee diversa tatnen; qualis decet esse sororum — Ovid. 

THE BIOGEN THEORY. 

But lest I may have overhauled the links of this chain too 
rapidly, let us retrace our steps for a moment. We have assum- 
ed or inferred the existence of this astral substance to account 
for the established facts of animal magnetism. We find that it 
has every proper character of a legitimate scientific theory, in 
that it is a priori probable; that if true it accounts for the facts; 
and that the facts have never been accounted for on any other 
theory in a way that will bear investigation. Science has two 
opposite, equally legitimate procedures in every investigation. 
Every one knows thes3 a"> induction and deduction. We may 
reason from particulars to generals, or conversely. In the form- 
er case, we establish our facts, and construct a theory to ac- 
count for them. In the latter case, we imagine or invent a theo- 
ry which seems reasonable, and proceed to try it upon the facts. 
If a single fact can be found to contradict our theory, it falls 
flat. If no fact disproves the theory, it stands; the more facts 
that sustain it, the stronger it stands. A theory constructed in- 
ductively is subject only to the limitations of observation, or 
the fallibility of reasoning processes. Such a theory is usually 
of slow growth, and correspondingly safe. The theory of grav- 
itation is a good example. Of deductive theories, that of the 
luminiferous ether is an illustration. No one knows whether 
it is true or not. But the whole modern science of Light pro- 
ceeds upon the assumption that it is true ; no optical fact has 
been found to disprove that assumption; many such facts tend 
to support it ; and the facts cannot be better accounted for on 



38 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

any other theory. This is precisely the present state of the Bi- 
ogen theory, as we have already seen. It has, therefore, as I 
have claimed, all the characters of legitimate deductive propo- 
sition in science, and the burden of proof is with those who 
dispute it. 

Like the luminif erous ether in space, this biogenic or 
magnetic or astral substance is everywhere. It penetrates all 
space, probably; certainly it interpenetrates all matter, resid- 
ing in matter side by side with the gross molecules which the 
chemist knows. It is in our bodies as well as in all other bod- 
ies, animate or inanimate. Animal magnetism, I repeat, is in 
all living animals, not excepting that one which crowns crea- 
tion. It is, in short, apart of the composition of man; an ele- 
ment of the human constitution. If special proof of this were 
requisite, I should only have to point to the unquestionable 
fact that this magnetic force proceeds from the magnetizer at 
his will ; and certainly nothing can be got out }f a man that is 
not in him. This is obvious. In mesmerizing, the operator is 
often aware that something has gone out of him. Some influence 
has proceeded from him, which it is no irreverence to liken to 
the virtue that departed when the woman touched the hem of 
the garment. If there happens to be in my audience a good 
clairvoyant to-night, or some one easily open to mediumistic 
influences, that person may have actually seen something not 
visible to all, when I may have flagged at a time and then spok- 
en with increased energy. Certainly I have been conscious in 
my own person of varying tension and relaxation of the mag- 
netic currents, and I have no doubt that in time we shall have 
instruments to record these ebbings and flowings with the same 
accuracy that the sphygmograph now records by the pulse the 
varying tension of the arteries. 

THE ASTRAL BODY. 

I have spoken to little purpose if my remarks have not 
gradually led you up to the pivotal idea I wish to present — the 
existence of the astral body, as a substantial entity. For my 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 39 

own part, I regard the astral body as proven. The demonstra- 
tion is to me complete, from not one but many experiences I 
have had in my own person ; from not one but many experiments 
I have made on the persons of others. But the popular verdict is 
— "impossible." The scientific verdict is the Scotch one — u not 
proven." It is to you, Gentlemen of the Psychical Society, that 
I appeal, to confirm or disprove the theory I advance. The ev- 
idence or testimony to the facts is established indisputably. 
The question remains as to the explanation of those facts of an- 
imal magnetism. I said that animal magnetism was the pass- 
key to psychic research, and then proceeded to discuss the man- 
ner in which that key is to be used. I indicated to what pur- 
pose it was to be turned. I meant to give you access to the 
very goal of sound psychic science, and I have done so. This is 
a demand for the recognition of the astral fluid as the medium 
of the manifestation of all spiritualistic phenomena, and the 
recognition of the twin fact, that a human being is partly com- 
posed of this same substance. On the heels of this very grave 
and momentous assertion, let me record a warning : You will 
make no satisfactory progress in psychic research along any 
other path than that which I have pointed out ; and you will 
have no solider body of psychic science than that which incorpo- 
rates the doctrine of the astral human form. This is the pivotal 
point on which all the rest turns — turns to sink, on the one 
hand, into some dull theory of nervous action, such as our text- 
books of physiology teem with; or turns, on the other hand, to 
rise and melt away in the cloudland of the visionary enthusiast. 
Sometimes I tremble at the thought, that the whole affair may 
be a question between the fool and the fanatic. Be it so; then 
I will adopt fanaticism as a profession. I prefer to side with 
those who help the world to move, and do not believe that it 
turns with a mere crank. 

THE BETTER WAY. 

Though I can thus point the way, and perhaps help some- 
what to find it, yet that way each one must tread for himself. 



40 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

Those who have entered upon the path know this way; those 
that live the life discover these things. The whole secret cannot 
be imparted. Many have found it; but not all seekers are find- 
ers. Strangely enough, one must first become aware of the ex- 
istence of the astral body in himself before he can use the fac- 
ulties of that body in psychical research. An abortive, rudi- 
mentary or decayed spiritual body, such as many persons pos- 
sess, is no fit instrument with which to discern supersensuous 
phenomena. Like the man in Mitchell's experiments on pain, 
who was the the necessary instrument of investigation, the 
psychic researcher himself is the instrument of psychic research 
and the demonstrator of his psychic science. Just as the natu- 
ral body, with its natural five senses and other natural or phys- 
ical faculties, is the apparatus of investigation of ordinary ma- 
terial or physical phenomena, so is the psychic or astral body, 
with its senses and faculties, the instrument ot research into ex- 
traordinary and non-material and non-physical phenomena. 
Most persons live and die with only the conscious exercise of 
their physical senses to guide their reason and enlighten their 
minds. Consequently, they know only those phenomena which 
address those senses. Hence they only become aware of mate- 
rial things. But there is an eye back of the outward eye. It is 
the inner, astral eye that catches ordinarily invisible rays. The 
clairvoyant's natural eye is shut when the other opens to the 
vision. There is an ear back of the outward ear. It is this that 
catches ordinarily inaudible sounds. The clairaudient's natu- 
ral ear is shut when the voice of the silence is heard. All these 
and other senses and faculties of the psychic body must be 
brought into operation to determine the truths of psychic sci- 
ence. These are not imaginary, in the usual sense of that word. 
They are indeed among the results of the exercise of the faculty 
of imagination in its proper creative activity. All realities 
are imaginary. Only unreal appearances pass for facts. They 
only pass for facts because "all things are to the sense that per- 
ceives them what to that sense they appear to be" (Garretson)* 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 41 

Those who perceive things with the body only, perceive only 
bodily things. Those who perceive things with the spirit have 
the faculty of discerning spirits. This is almost a truism. It 
is necessarily axiomatic. But the thing is so simple that it is 
seldom found out. The majesty of truth is Oneness. 

NATURAL MAGIC. 

You have all heard of the practice of occultism ; of so-call- 
ed operative magic; of the training of adepts; of the develop- 
ing of the mediumistic faculty — for such are phrases of the The- 
osophists and of the Spiritualists. But do I not invest these 
terms with a new or different meaning, not at all unreasonable 
or supernatural, when I speak of them as the exercise of the psy- 
chic faculties and the direction of such means to a desired end? 
Mediumship is, in fact, the activity of the psychic senses more 
or less intelligently and consciously open to impressions made 
upon them by psychic forces, whether these forces proceed from 
an intelligence still embodied, or from an intelligence which 
has left its tenement of clay. Far from me be it to say that 
this last is never true. On the contrary, I think it is true, and 
not very rare. If so, the claims of the Spiritualists, — their 
statement of what is called "spirit communication," may readily 
be conceded. It is wholly within the bounds of natural sci- 
entific possibility, and nothing appears to forbid the most cau- 
tious person to entertain the idea. In this case, the interchange 
of thoughts and feelings and wishes and wits between us who 
are here and others who have gone on, becomes a fact in psy- 
chic science of the utmost possible moment. What is that 
"adeptship" of which we hear the Theosophists speak, if not 
the full activity of the psychic senses, trained to do the will of 
their master? They act under the conscious and intelligent op- 
eration of an expert in psychic science, and impress upon other 
psychic organisms the thoughts that the adept desires. If there 
be any truth in this, the claims of the Theosophists, which 
seem so wild, may after all be found within the limits of sober 
facts. They are certainly more amenable to verification by ex- 



42 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

periment, than those of mediumship. For example, the alleged 
communication between two bodies of Theosophists, by the 
"projection of the double" or some similar means, is reducible 
to a simple experiment in psychic science. If any such com- 
munication be possible between trained adepts in the flesh, it 
should not be impossible between one such and another who has 
cast off the flesh. 

In very truth, the relation between the spirit-world and 
the matter-world is that of substance and shadow. The latter 
does not exist apart from the former. All matter is but the ev- 
idence of spirit. That is an "evidence of things unseen" which 
may not have occurred to all readers of a certain book. The 
relation between the two is one of cause and effect. The inter- 
dependence is absolute ; it is universal ; it is everlasting ; it is 
here; it is now. "I am that I am," says Jehovah. And when 
you make the same discovery respecting yourselves, you will 
cease to ask idle questions of Theosophy. 

The phenomena of mediumship and of adeptship, if not 
fully explained, are capable at least of being brought under one 
broader law of equal applicability to both. They differ only in 
degree, not in kind. We see in them both the possibility of 
successful psychic research, the material for sound psychic sci- 
ence, and the probability that the pivotal propositions of the 
Spiritualist and of the Theosophist may become demonstrable 
theorems which, so far from refuting or antagonizing one anoth- 
er, do countenance and confirm one another, each rendering the 
other more likely to be established. That is a consummation 
devoutly to be wished by every lover of truth. 

Do I then believe in spirits and in spirit intercourse? As- 
suredly I do ! For am I not a spirit, like every one of you? 
Do I not communicate with this visible world by my natural 
body, my visible apparatus of relation with the phenomenal 
world, without being thereby shut out from my spiritual pre- 
rogative of communicating with such other spirits as I can reach, 
on another plane, by the spiritual body appropriate to that 



FROM THE STANDPOINT OF A SCIENTIST. 43 

plane of existence? Ask me for my authority for this statement, 
and I point first to the ascertained facts of psychic science. 
But if other authority be acceptable, I may quote one whom not 
many will be inclined to dispute when I repeat the solemn 
words : "There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body," 

THE OUTLOOK. 

What now, my friends, think you, are the real "Signs of the 
Times" when such questions as we have discussed to-night are 
to the fore? We know not, indeed, what a day may bring forth, 
when that day is on the turning point of one of the great natu- 
ral cycles of the evolution of the human race. Not single and 
isolated are the spiritual phenomena we have so hurriedly re- 
viewed. They are signaled by greater terrestrial disturbances 
than have been witnessed on an equal scale for many a day. 
Volcanic action has sunken parts of the earth's crust, and alter- 
ed the coast lines of continents. The dust of the conflict of 
these Titanic forces has reddened the very sky. Earthquakes 
have shaken the solid ground; and not less active than these 
grand cosmic forces are the spiritual energies at work, exact 
counterparts of physical agencies. Men and women are shak- 
en in the beliefs of a life-time. Things sacred and things pro- 
fane seem melting indistinguishable in the single crucible of the 
mind. Every revered religious creed is fiercely assailed and 
hotly defended. The challenge of Science to Religion resounds. 
The counterblast of the Church to the State echoes back that 
defiance. Every where are old foundations shaken; every 
where the scaffolding of new structures is erected. The times 
are revolutionary in thought, in feeling, in belief. Nothing is 
too wild or fanciful to find its heralds; nothing is too securely 
grounded for attack. Emerson said : "Beware when the great 
God lets loose a thinker in the world." But lo ! here are thous- 
ands of thinkers all around us, thinking for themselves with 
small deference to authority, and little regard for precedent, cus- 
tom or established institutions. Thoughts are free and the 
thinkers are freed, as perhaps never before in the history of the 



44 THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES 

world. Who shall be the moderator in this vast throng where 
every one clamors to be heard? My eyes turn wistfully back 
to the fixed faith of bygone years — where is it? We must look 
forward, though in all the glare it takes a steady eye to discern 
undimmed the truth that is surely advancing. Physical science 
has well-nigh conquered the physical realm. May we not hope- 
fully turn to psychical science to establish also her kingdom 
on the earth? The problem of the day is not a question of 
matter; it is a question of mind; and the problem of mind has 
ceased to be only a question of the intellect. It has become 
the cry of the soul for more light in the dungeon of the body I 
This cry goes up the loudest from the women of the land, be- 
cause her soul's imprisonment is harder to bear than man's, and 
her duty to redeem a world is more imperative. A great con- 
vention of women is but an outward sign. The real sign most 
legible is the inward compact that woman's soul has made with 
her spiritual self. That is the covenant of a new dispensation 
to reincarnate the God in man, as the final triumph of spirit 
over matter. That is the law of life, here and hereafter. That 
is the Master's Word, forever lost and found again, that every 
man himself shall know and do the will of the Most High. 



CONSENSUS OF THE COMPETENT. 



The domain of Psychics and the realm of Spirit so long claimed 
by theological dogmatists as their exclusive possessions, and under 
their tyrannical sway, are being gradually thrown open to the world. 
Men of science and members of the learned professions are join- 
ing forces with the masses in a persistent and determined effort 
to explore these mysterious possessions, and to develop them in the 
interests of humanity at large. The enterprise is alluring; the prize 
magnificent; but the first is not without its dangers, and the last 
lies beyond the Mountain of Endeavor. 

After reading the very able essay of Dr. Coues, on "The Signs of 
the Times," one of the first inquiries which will arise in the mind of 
him who has mastered it and desires to begin a search for himself 
will be: " How can I best learn to guard myself against error and 
where can I secure a competent and faithful assistant for the dif- 
ficult work of scaling the mountain?" To all such inquirers the 
perusal of the following pages is respectfully commended. 

In every activity of life, and especially in politics, religion and 
science, the newspaper has become the most powerful agent and the 
greatest disseminator of knowledge and opinions. In its particular 
field it is generally acknowledged that the Religio-Philosophical 
Journal has no equal; that it far surpasses all other similar publi- 
cations in those features which commend a paper to educated, 
thoughtful, rational, earnest people. From a large number of fresh 
communications and opinions, the following are selected and spread 
on these pages as the testimony of representative men of wide repu- 
tation who, while differing with one another and with the Religio- 
Philosophical Journal in regard to many things, all agree in bear- 
ing testimony to the ability, courage, vigor, scientific spirit, and judi- 
cial fairness of the paper. 



CONSENSUS OF THE COMPETENT, 

Elliott Ooues, A. M., M. D., Ph. D., Naturalist, Etc, 
Gnostic Theosophical Society, 

Washington, D. C., Sept. 21, 1888. 

Editor Religio-Philosophical Journal: — The Journal is al- 
ready recognized as the ablest exponent of Spiritualistic doctrine in 
America, and no Theosophist or Psychic Researcher can fail to 
note with satisfaction its persistent endeavor to place the phenome- 
na of Spiritualism on a proper basis The world does like cour- 
age, candor, sincerity, earnestness and resolution, however much 
the cynics may decry these qualities; and they do not depend for 
their telling effect upon coincidence with logical truth or the re- 
verse. They are in themselves moral forces, to which the intellect is 
only subservient. 

Though I have allowed my name to become in some measure 
identified with the modern cult which is now widely known under 
the name of " Theosophy," and though I have acquired through this 
association some knowledge concerning which I think it inexpedi- 
ent at present to take the public into my confidence, I am far from 
insisting upon the superiority of theosophical doctrines for all per- 
sons or all purposes 

I recognize and endorse the Journal's "open-court" policy 
— its actual and not merely ostensible openness and judicial impar- 
tiality. Its columns are as open to those of my own communion as 
to the enemies of the cult I represent, if they have anything to say 

and know how to say it 

Very truly yours, 

ELLIOTT COUES, F. T. S., Pres't, etc. 



B. F. Underwood, Author, Lecturer on Philosophical and 
Scientific Subjects, and Journalist: 

86 So. Page Street, Chicago, September 29th, 1888. 
Dear Colonel Bundy: — Although not a Spiritualist, I am, as I 
have been for years, an interested reader of the Journal, in which 
I fiud a great deal to approve and admire 1 wish to see all gen- 
uine psychic phenomena carefully and thoroughly examined. An 
independent, incorruptible journalism at this time needs encourage- 
ment, and it has no worthier representative than the Journal. 

Sincerely yours, B. F. UNDERWOOD. 



CONSENSUS OF THE COMPErENT. 

B. Heber Newton, D. D., Rector of "All Souls' Church," 
(Protestant Episcopal), New York City: 

Garden City, New York, October 30th, 3888. 
Dear Colonel Bundy: Yon know my position on the u anx- 
ious bench." "Almost persuaded " at times, and then again repell- 
ed by the superabounding fraud in the movement, I represent hosts 
of men who must be deeply concerned to see the Journal prose- 
cute its fearless work, and sift out the true from the false, so that 
outsiders may be able to judge intelligently. Every one must hope 
that Spiritualism maybe able to verify its superlatively important 

claims If Spiritualists really believe what they profess, they ought 

to back you up vigorously in the work ycu are doing. Nothing but 

such a work will enable the general public to believe 

Yours cordially, R. HEBER NEWTON. 



George H. Hepworth, Author and Journalist. 

New York, September, 26th, 1888. 

My Dear Bundy: — As you know, while I am not a Spiritual- 
ist, I have leanings that way; for all that is good, beautiful and true 
in the theory that our friends are not "lost, but gone before "; that 
they are never so far away as to be beyond reach; that u a cloud of 
witnesses" hold us "in full survey," and that the alarm bells in 
heaven are rung whenever we are in the pinch of dire distress, I have 
great admiration. For the large admixture of humbug, fraud and 
impudence, however, which stares us in the face at every turn, I 
have an unbounded and inexpressible contempt. 

You have helped! by your able Journal to expose and drive 
these fiends, who coin cash out of bleeding and stricken hearts, to 

their holes You have crushed them under your trip-hammer 

like filberts, and dragged them out into the light for the world's scorn 
and detestation. 

All right! You have done, and are doing, a good work. We 
who are in the rushing tide of life, too busy with the affairs of this 
world to do more than wonder concerning the next, need some 
wholesome suggestions, good reading, solutions of difficulties, an- 
swers to doubts. You can help us amazingly to "bear the ills we 
have," if you can furnish us with a literature that has its base in un- 
deniable facts. So I say, go ahead, and God spare you. 

Yours sincerely, GEO. H. HEPWORTH. 



CONSENSUS OF THE COMPETENT. 

Hudson Tuttle, Author, Lecturer on Philosophical and Sci- 
entific subjects, and Writer for the Press. 

Berlin Heights, Ohio, September 28th, 1888. 
My Dear Bundy: — .... That the Religio-Philosophical Jour- 
nal has been able to maintain its fearless independence in the face 
of all opposition and to utter editorially and through its contributors 
much that was in advance of the general Spiritualist sentiment, and 
live to see these utterances finally accepted as truth and echoed in 
other channels, is something phenomenal and almost unprecedented. 
Such a record entitles its editor and publisher to the unlimited and 

generous confidence of the public May the angels strengthen 

the hands of all connected with it. 

Fraternally, HUD30N TUTTLE. 



M. J. Savage, Pastor of the "Church of the Unity/' Boston, 
Autnor and Poet. 

Colonel J. C. Bundy: — My Dear Sir: .... I know enough, 
through my own personal experiences, to feel sure that this psychic 
field is thoroughly worth exploring, and I feel equally sure that the 
path marked out by your spirit and methods, is the only way. You 
have so identified yourself with sense and honesty, that your victory 
will be their victory. I cannot help believing that, more and more, 

all clear- vision ed and honest men will be with you With all 

faith in you, and with all good wishes for your success, I am 

Most sincerely, M. J. SAVAGE. 

Boston, October 8th, 1888. 



H. W. Thomas, D. D, Pastor of "The Peoples' Church," 
Chicago, Illinois: 

Dear Bro. Bundy: — .... The higher phases and interests of 
man's strange life must more and more come to the front; and in do- 
ing this, they must become more orderly, more systematic, and even 
scientific in form and statement; and as far as may be, more verita- 
ble in personal experience. But this will not, and can not come all 
at once; nor to all at the same time; it must wait upon the slow de- 
velopment of the higher in each one, and hence the need of such a 
Religio-Philosophical Journal of facts and experiences and reas- 
onings and suggestions and of criticism, exposures even, as you have 
for years published. .... 

Man is yet to come out upon that high and luminous way where 
he will realize that he is a spirit, and that he should emphasize that 



CONSENSUS OF THE COMPETENT. 

which is highest and best in himself and in his fellow beings; and to 
this end our age needs a spiritual philosophy, a spiritual religion, a 
spiritual literature; in a word, everything that helps to that higher 
state. May God bless you in your noble endeavors. 

Affectionately, H. W. THOMAS. 

Chicago, Illinois, October 5th, 1888. 

W. H. Herndon, Abraham Lincoln's old Law partner, Bosom 
Friend and Biographer. 

Springfield, Illinois, November 26th, 1888. 

Friend Bundy: — I am extremely busy reading proof-sheets 

of my Life of Lincoln, which I hope will be out— say in Feb. next. 
.... I admire your course— a heroic one, you well know; and wish 
you success in your struggle to uplift mankind. You are correct! 
everything is governed by law — matter and mind — nothing is law- 
less. Your method of arriving at truth, through observation, expe- 
rience and reason, is the correct one; not discarding wholly the de- 
ductive Go ahead just as you are going, and it will all end 

right in some, probably now unknown, direction; while it will prove 
what you are struggling for. I am most heartily with you in all this. 
Your friend, W. H. HERNDON. 



E. P. Powell, Preacher, Journalist, and Author of "Our 
Heredity from God." 

Clinton, New York, September 21st, 1888. 
My Dear Bundy:— You know I am not technically a Spiritualist, 
but underneath even the terrible load of fraud and trash called spirit- 
ual, I believe there is the all-important fact that man is in evolution 
beyond the purely material stage. With your magnificent effort to de- 
feat materialistic M Spiritualism," and give us the warm and vital 
oneness with Life — the All-Life, you have won the heartiest sympa- 
thy of not only myself but of all sincere workers and thinkers 

Allow me as an outsider to extend you the warm right hand of an 

evolutionist 

Yours most heartily, E. P. POWELL. ; 



PUBLISHER'S STATEMENT. 

The Religio-Philosophical Journal, In the estimation of a large pro- 
portion of the leading authorities on Spiritualism, stands pre-eminent as a 
fearless, independent, judicially fair advocate of Spiritualism. It is admired 
and respected not only by reflecting, critical Spiritualists, but by the large 
constituency just outside the spiritualistic ranks, who are looking longingly 
and hopefully toward Spiritualism as the beacon light which may guide to 
higher, broader grounds, and give a clearer insight to the soul's capabilities 
and destiny. It is disliked by some very good but very weak people; it is 
hated by all who aim to use Spiritualism as a cloak to serve their selfish pur- 
poses. The Journal has received more general notice, and more frequent 
and higher commendations from intelligent sources, regardless of sect or 
party, than any other Spiritualist or liberal paper ever published ; the records 
will confirm this. 

The Journal is uncompromisingly committed to the Scientific Method, 
In its treatment of the Phenomena of Spiritualism, being fully assured that 
this is the only safe ground on which to stand. Firmly convinced by rigid in- 
vestigation, thaX life continues beyond the grave and that spirits can and do 
return and manifest at times and under certain conditions, the Journal 
does not fear the most searching criticism and crucial tests in sustaining its 
position. 



Some Reasons Why Rational, Broad-Minded People 
fiike the Religio-Philosophieal Journal. 

The Journal lends its active support to every scheme adapted to the 
amelioration of man. 

The Journal is unsectarian, non-partizan, thoroughly independent, 
never neutral, wholly free from cliques and clans. 

The Journal is ever ready to back an honest medium with all its power, 
and its bottom dollar; it is equally ready to drive into the bottom of the last 
ditch every persistent, unrepenting swindler. 

The Journal is published in the interests of Spiritualism and the gen- 
eral public; its columns can never be used to grind the axes of individuals, 
nor as a channel for cranks, charlatans and hobbyists to reach the public. 

The Journal opens its columns to all who have something to say and 
know how to say it well, whether the views are in accord with its own or not; 
It courts fair and keen criticism and invites honest, searching inquiry. 

The Journal has a large and well-trained corps of regular and occasion- 
al contributors and correspondents, not only in America, but in England , 
France, Germany, Italy, Russia, and Australia, and is therefore always in re- 
ceipt of the earliest and most trustworthy information on all subjects coming 
within its scope. 



TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION. 

One Copy One Year - $2.50 

One Copy Six Months - 1.25 

Specimen Copy Sent Free. 

Remittances should be made by P. 0. Money Order, Postal Note or 
Draft on Chicago or New York, payable to John C. Bundy. 
Address all letters and communications to 



JOHN C. BUNDY. Chicago, III. 



MH,fi«,!i!y 0F CONGRESS 



022 007 244 7 



THE BIOGEN SERIES. 

JEclitecl 13 >- 

PROFESSOR COUES, 



No. 1. 



No. 



No. 



No. 4. 



No. 5. 



BIOGEN: A Speculation on the Origin and Nature of Life. 
By Elliott Coues. Boston: Estes & Lauriat. Fifth edition. 

THE D.EMON OF DARWIN. By Elliott Coues. Boston: 
Estes & Lauriat. Third edition. 

A BUDDHIST CATECHISM. By Hen r, S. Oleott, with Notes 
by Elliott Coues. Boston: Estes & Lauriat. Second edi. 
tion.. 

CAN MATTER THINK? By an Occultist. Edited by Elli- 
ott Coues. Boston: Estes & Lauriat. Second edition. 

KUTHUMI: The True and Complete Oeconomy of Human 
Life, based on the system of Theosophical Ethics. Bos- 
ton: Estes & Lauriat. A New Edition. 



^ By the Same Author: 

A WOMAN IN THE CASE. Washington: Brentano. 1887. 



FOR SALE, 

At the Office of the RELIGIO-PHILOSOPHICAL JOURNAL, 

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS. 



